I’m finally updating! Sorry it’s been a while, I lost all motivation to write book reviews except on Netgalley (my ratio was awful so I focussed on getting through a bunch of ARCs, will write about them here at some point soon!) so I’ve picked a few recent reads, taken some photos and now I’m scheduling some posts!
I’d seen Ramona Blue floating around twitter for quite a while and finally picked it out this month. I gather that it garnered quite a lot of controversy before it was published due to poor blurbing; from what I remember the concern was that it was a story about a lesbian finding the right guy to turn her straight. In reality it’s a YA novel partly about the fluid nature of sexuality and a teen questioning labels, partly about the ties of family and living in poverty in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
Ramona lives in a trailer with her hardworking dad, pregnant sister and her babydaddy. She identifies as a lesbian openly but begins to question how fluid her sexuality may be when an old friend returns to her small town.
I’m not personally comfortable commenting on the bisexual rep in the book, particularly as I’ve seen mixed opinions in the reviews I’ve read by bi people. Chelsea points out that the word ‘bisexual’ is never once used in the book (minor spoilers alert) which soured the book for her, but I’ve read other ownvoice reviews (an example here from BisexualBooks contains heavy spoilers) that have praised the rep. I defer to people who have actual lived experience.
Otherwise, this to me was a great story about family love, poverty and learning to take selfish steps in the face of what we perceive to be our duties. Ramona gains a love of swimming, an outlet in her life which otherwise revolves around worrying about money, her sister and her soon-to-arrive niece. Ramona’s life has been heavily influenced by Hurricane Katrina, which decimated her small town years before, and it’s a powerful comment on how the effects of such events have ramifications that last far beyond media interest. The story also touches upon the ways race means different experiences for different people; there’s a scene which is just plain fun for Ramona and her group, but which her friend Freddie rightly points out could have had deadly consequences for him as a black teen.
I really enjoyed this book, it was much more than a romance, which in not generally that interested in!
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